A life, recovered / 1884–1962
Nolan David Smith
A Navarro County beginning, a family across Texas and Oklahoma, and a portrait returned to view.
Nolan David Smith. Premium HIM restoration from the supplied family portrait; damaged and indistinct details are interpretive.
01
Navarro County origins
Nolan David Smith was born in Navarro County, Texas, on April 11, 1884, according to his Texas death certificate. It names his parents as Will Smith and Tennessee Lane. A later family-tree compilation expands his father’s name to William Henry Smith and calls his mother Tennessee C. “Tennie” Lane.
The family-tree export also contains duplicate alternate entries assigning his birth to 1885. The 1884 date is the one on the death certificate; the alternate tree entries remain noted rather than silently merged.
Sources: Texas certificate of death — Nolan David Smith · Nolan David Smith — family-tree facts export
Texas certificate of death recording Nolan’s April 11, 1884 birth, March 10, 1962 death in Dallas, parents Will Smith and Tennessee Lane, and Palmer City Cemetery burial.
View the source record →02
Jessie and their family
Nolan married Jessie Quenile Walker in Navarro County on September 1, 1902. Their daughter Tennie Lee Smith was born in Pursley on May 16, 1910. Jessie’s family record names their other children as Willie Finest, Lula Idalia Faye “Duck,” Ora Melissa, Jake Walker Richard, Raymond Parker, and Thaura Dee.
The exported family tree also lists an unnamed infant daughter with Tennie’s same birth date. That entry needs independent confirmation before it can be treated as a separate person or a twin.
Sources: Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and chronology · Nolan David Smith — family-tree facts export
03
Texas, Oklahoma, and Palmer
The family chronology places Nolan in Navarro County in 1900 and 1910, Wilson in Atoka County, Oklahoma, in 1920, and Looney in Harmon County in 1930. It lists Pursley again in 1942. Those entries trace places, though they do not explain every move.
Nolan’s death certificate calls him a retired farmer and records a rural Lancaster mailing address. He died at Parkland Hospital in Dallas on March 10, 1962, at age seventy-seven, and was taken to Palmer City Cemetery in Ellis County. Jessie had died in 1937.
Sources: Nolan David Smith — family-tree facts export · Texas certificate of death — Nolan David Smith · Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and chronology
04
The portrait and the record
The full-length studio photograph supplied under Nolan’s name is the visual anchor of this page. The black-and-white HIM treatment repairs fading and print damage. Any detail reconstructed where the original is indistinct is interpretive.
His death certificate is shown separately as a record of dates, occupation, parent names and burial place. The original photograph and the family-tree exports remain preserved with the research materials.
Sources: Nolan David Smith — supplied studio portrait · Texas certificate of death — Nolan David Smith
Look a little closer
The photographs
hold more of the story.
Open any image to see the complete photograph. Captions name the people and places in each photograph.
The opening image and the photograph in the story are the available visual record for this profile.
Return to Nolan’s death certificate ↑Continue through the archive
One life leads to another.
Behind this biography
Sources & further reading
These sources support the biography and its continuing research.
- Texas certificate of death — Nolan David Smith ↗
Dallas County death certificate; date of birth April 11, 1884; death March 10, 1962 at Parkland Hospital; parents Will Smith and Tennessee Lane; retired farmer; Palmer City Cemetery. Direct record. The tree export lists alternate 1885 entries.
- Nolan David Smith — family-tree facts export
Ancestry family tree 14759972, person 18285763737, supplied October 26, 2026. Consolidated research; duplicate birth and residence entries and the unnamed infant require separate verification.
- Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and chronology ↗
Marriage, children, and household chronology.
- Nolan David Smith — supplied studio portrait
Labeled family photograph and approved interpretive HIM restoration; date of photograph unknown.